Description

Depression during pregnancy is associated with postpartum depression, which potentially has lasting effects on maternal and child well-being. Socio-economically disadvantaged women are at increased risk for perinatal depression and often have difficulty accessing evidence-based depression care. MOMCare is an 18-month culturally relevant collaborative care intervention in which participants can choose brief interpersonal psychotherapy or antidepressants or both. Compared to intensive public health Maternity Support Services (MSS-Plus), MOMCare shows significant, sustained improvement in quality of care and depressive outcomes from before birth to one-year postpartum for socio-economically disadvantaged women with perinatal depression. In addition, MOMCare had a greater impact on depressive outcomes for socio-economically disadvantaged women with comorbid PTSD than for those without PTSD.

Presenter

Nancy Grote, PhD, is a research associate professor, School of Social Work, and adjunct research associate professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Washington. She is a research psychologist, a social worker with 20 years of clinical practice experience, and a nationally recognized mental health services researcher who works to improve depression care for socio-economically disadvantaged women of child-bearing age. Dr. Grote has received a prestigious Career Development Award from the National Institute of Mental Health and is currently the principal investigator of the National Institute of Mental Health funded MOMCare Program at the University of Washington, School of Social Work and Department of Psychiatry. The program provides evidence-based treatments for perinatal depression to diverse, underserved, low-income women receiving public health services in Seattle and King County, Washington.